The Chanterelle overflows with charisma in a body of gold. The Horn of plenty is symbolic of abundance, for both better and worse. The Enokitake is what some would call common, but those who say that know not of his many suits. Last is the Tuber, whose stubbornness has born aggravation in many, but also admiration in some. It is from these four that my name, Chet, is derived. And yes, I do hate my parents for it.
I am a humble cultivator of mushrooms born to the rural south of our serene nation of Lowee. That is, I farm them for sale in town. It is not the most glamorous of professions, no, but it is preferable to have to wash your hands of manure before every meal than it is to not eat.
I work from the dusk 'til the dawn, and from dawn 'til dusk to keep myself eating properly. It's a management job more than anything else. I plan out my daily schedule, making time to eat and sleep properly while working as much as I can. I manage my expenses for equipment and cost of labor, and on labor I have to balance out the most skilled of the local mercenaries to how badly in need of protection I am in any particular outing.
What? Do you think a hired sword is a little over the top for a mushroom hunt? Well, sometimes I need to raid a dungeon to get the biggest bang for my buck. Mind, when I say I raid dungeons, I do not mean for treasure, though I won't pass up a good score if'n I happen to find such a payout. That's right, I dungeoneer not for mob drops, but for mob droppings!
I wasn't kidding about having to wash my hands of manure every day, no. It's a well-known fact that the quality of dogoo manure (with consideration toward the cultivation of fungus) increases with their level. And if dogoo manure is sufficient to grow grocery store quality shrooms, imagine the quality of the quality of the mushrooms I'd have growing on my plot if I rock up a dungeon and nick the shit of a dragon?
And more importantly, think of the money I'll make out of the deal!
Mercenaries are satisfied with taking my share of the loot for their pay. What they don't know is that I'll make twice what they take in from clearing out a dungeon by sitting on the sidelines and taking home a literal load of crap.
Hooray for me!
It should be noted, however, that there is, as of yet, no reliable studies which point to the quality of mob manure against the level of the mob aside from dogoos and other low level mobs. Also, the data collected from low level mobs other than dogoos have proven less than entirely consistent. Not that it matters much to me, tho. My prices won't change just because science doesn't have my back yet. It's all about appearances, and believe it or not people will actually buy mushrooms based on what kind of shit it sprouted out of.
I'm not complaining. I've been able to make a killing by risking my life and the lives of various foolhardy mercs in dungeon after dungeon just to sell mushrooms to people who haven't the faintest clue how my mushrooms are superior to the dime-store brand. I've even been able to afford a full renovation job on my store here. What was once just a four footed tent in the middle of the farmers' market I've now built up to be a proper shop in Lowee's capital city.
I now stand in the center of a still humble shop floor, flanked on all sides by walls of taupe. Jars of mushrooms displayed on shelves of similarly painted hard wood. I've set four long tables stood in the middle of the floor meant to serve the same function. The cash register (probably my favorite part of the shop) sits atop a wooden counter top which juts out of the wall.
"Mr. Faeriering?" Speaking of the register, Lamy seems to be calling me out. She's the one I've got working the register. "Mr. Faeriering, are you still there?" Incidentally, Faeriering happens to be my surname. It's another source of my sourness, but it's one I can't entirely blame on my parents.
"No, La-La. I'm having a bit of an introspective. Is there anything you need?" Admittedly, I'm a bit young to be having these little internal monologues, but at twenty-one I realize that my accumulated wealth has a long time it needs to last along the road to my retirement.
"Oh, it can wait until you're done." Said little Lamy, who's gotten very well adjusted to the work environment here.
"Very good." Now, where was I? I think I was talking about Lamy, yes?"
Alrighty then. Now, Lamy, or La-La as I call her at work, is just another school girl from one of the… I'll say that it's one of the 7/10 high schools here, neither the best nor the worst. Her dream, apparently, is to explore dungeons and fight monsters and all that jazz. I think the whole notion is batty, but I sometimes take her with me when I explore some of the lower level dungeons. The fact that she hasn't run home scared like a mouse within the clear predatory view of a Bengal tiger tells me that she's at least sort of serious about adventuring.
I'm still not convinced that she knows all of that she could of her dreams, but she's capable enough I suppose. I certainly wouldn't want anything to happen to her after she finally comes of age to explore this vast world of ours, regardless of whether she really decides to become an adventurer or not.
I look at her now, that soft brown vest wrapped so well on her torso so pleasing to the eyes. Her soft features like a pillow to the face, soothing and warm from the slight widow's peak on her forehead, to her long black locks which perfectly frame her heart shaped face and hide away her ears, to her flat lower half which leads to six segmented, exoskeletal legs and her two stinger tails. An exotic beauty in no mistake.
"Mr. Faeriering…," Lamy's weak utterance instantly awoke me from the beginnings of my newest fantasy to be. My eye's snapped to her face, the redness of which she so futilely attempted to cover with one hand. "You were staring at my bottom half again, weren't you?"
When you act as you do now, m'love, I can't help but wonder which half I'm more interested in. "Don't worry, girl. I wouldn't dare touch a girl before she comes of age." Lowee is very strict when it comes to her laws concerning such things. Go figure. "Speaking of, how old are you again?" I didn't actually say that, of course. I'd be too afraid of scaring off my favorite employee. She saves me the cost of hiring a mercenary when I take her along with me for a dungeon run.
"I really wish you wouldn't joke around like that, Mr. Faeriering." She pouted, her face like molten iron.
"Wasn't joking, m'love. What kind of man would I be if I lusted after a schoolgirl?" I say that, and instantly I feel the chill of the hundreds of thousands of kindred spirits wishing ill upon me for condemning them. "Don't worry about it. I won't lay a hand on you."
"I know." She said, curtly.
High school girls are such a curious breed, but that's a discussion for another day. Now is the time for business. "La-La, how have sales been today?" I don't know why I even asked that when I've been here all day.
"It's been slow, Sir. People don't spend much money on mushrooms in the middle of the Spring Anime Season." Said Lamy, who I know must've had her DVR set before she went to work. "Blade Warriors is playing right now. I'm pretty sure that all my friends are probably watching it right now…." She puts on a dutiful face, yet that only makes her look more pitiful.
Ah, whatever. I'm feeling merciful today. "La-La, do you want an extension on your break?" I ask her, just to remedy that horribly pitiful look she's giving me.
"Can I really?" She asked me, positively sparkling.
"You've an hour and a half. That should give you more than enough time to watch the end of Blade Warriors and… and whatever else you want to watch."
Lamy's face lit up with a lovely excitement. "Thank you, Mr. Faeriering!" With that, she skittered off. Her six scorpion legs carrying her off with at a breakneck pace. "I'll get back to the register right after Bamboo Braver!" She said, her voice fading as the distance between her legs and the break room shortened like a stick of beef jerky in front in the mouth of my bitch neighbor's yappy dog.
It's a pity I only have her working four days out of the week. Lamy's my favorite. "Now if she'd only call me Mr. Chet, she'd be like my dream girl…. In a few years I mean."
"That'ssss a dangerous thing to say, Mr. Faeriering." And then I jumped out of my shoes.
"Who!?" I leapt a good couple of feet in the direction opposite of the voice which had sent chills up my spine.
With an unabashedly satisfied and toothy smile was Dr. Boomslang, a local medicine woman of sorts. I say medicine woman and not outright doctor of medicine because of her use of herbal medications in most of her prescription. Consequently, she is the biggest source of revenue for my shop here, both directly through her purchases, as well as her many patients who pass here on her recommendation. Her contributions to my wallet happen to be one of the only reasons I haven't put a restraining order on her yet because this lady IS CREEPY AS HELL.
"Could you stop ninja-ing around my place of business? It's hard to maintain a respectable front when you scare me out of my pants." I complained to her as my heart threatened to beat its way out of my chest.
"I'm no ninja, Mr. Faeriering. I'm a doctor." She says, smiling with all her thirty-something canines bared, and the thin slits she calls pupils focused squarely on me. "Don't tell me you're sscared of me."
"I will tell you that I'm scared of you because you're freakin' scary!" I step back and away from her.
With every step I take back, she takes one forward. Together, we do a sort of tangled dance at a distance across my sales floor. I manage to shuffle around until a table sits between me and her. The pale green of her scleral only glowed to me as would a predator to its prey. Her movements appeared slow and her body swayed like the leaves of a banana tree in the wind to mask her, but her true speed was given away by the subtle swaying of her brassy bob and by the much more noticeable sways of the tails of her white lab coat.
"You wear the white of an angel, but only black could ever suit you." I hissed as my enemy made her way towards me.
"So you're saying I'd look better in black? Well…, that's awfully forward of you Mr. Faeriering, but I'll take what I wear into consideration next time I visit."
"Don't take what I say and make it sound like a pickup line!" I'm raising my voice now. I try not to let myself get to that point, but you'd never know that from the way me and Boomslang go at it. "You've bought your stock for this month, why are you even here? I had the local clergy bless this place just to keep you away!"
"You really know how to make a girl feel special, Mr. Faeriering." She giggles in a nefarious way that makes it decidedly uncute. "I didn't come here without reason, my jumpy, nervous love."
"Don't call me 'love' when I have no love for you!" And that's something I'd shout from the rooftops. "You know you're never to show your face here on the week days."
"Why are you so mean when I only came to give you an update on our little dream?"
With that, my anxiety towards her vanished. My eyes snapped to lock with her gaze, and my ears blocked off all sound save for that of Boomslang's wretched voice. "What do you mean?"
"You know exactly what I'm talking about." She knows that she has my undivided attention now, and she takes a pause just to see if I'll pop from anxiety. "That mythical little fungus told of in legend. Stories as old as history itself tell of a mushroom, now thought either to be extinct or never to have existed in the first place."
I'm starting to get excited now. "A mushroom whose legend finds root in the tales of the creation of Leanbox. In tales of when that nation was but a loose collection of various matriarchal tribes. In a time before Leanbox or Lastation or Planeptune or Lowee."
"Before even the lands of Tari are believed to have been." Boomslang was every bit as into this as I am. "A mushroom that when eaten would then augment the growth of a woman's bosom!"
"Tuber leanboxes tuberum!" I shouted.
"The legendary boing truffle!" Her enthusiasm rivaled mine.
In the heat of the moment, and probably with a bit of poor judgment, I embraced Boomslang in my arms. I was overcome by lust for the money and the power which this discovery could entail. Normally my skin would crawl if I even came close to Boomslang's person, but now, in my excitement I held her in my arms, and she held me in hers.
I'm sure you must be wondering, why all this fuss over a single truffle? Well this truffle's legend really speaks for itself, doesn't it? A fungus that could boost the breast size of any woman who eats it. Personally, I like 'em bigger, but this is about more than just my taste in women. This is about nationalism, and I have lived in the nation of Lowee long enough to know that if I were to present the Tuber leanboxes tuberum to our Goddess, Lady White Heart, a lifetime of wealth and ease awaits me!
"And then we can get married!" Said Boomslang, whose proposition had slightly more standing in reality than Lady Blanc's dreams of fitting one of Lady Vert's bras.
"If we can find that truffle, I guess anything's possible! Ha ha!" Who cares, really? I can get married to as many women as I want once I find that mushroom.
"Mr. Faeriering?" Unmistakably, that was Lamy's voice calling me. Was she done watching her anime already? "I heard yelling, are you alright?" Innocently, Lamy peeked in from the hall into the sales floor to see Boomslang and I in the middle of our embrace.
Now, this would be fine if I were hoding anyone else, but Lamy and Boomslang have a bit of an issue with each other. It's for the same reason that I don't let Boomslang in the shop on the weekdays. I think they called it an issue of instinct or something to that effect.
None of that information particularly mattered to me on its own, but as Lamy's tails got into optimal striking position, and as Boomslang bared her many teeth and hissed with her elongated and forked human tongue extended, I started to worry about how my shop would look once the smoke clears. Together the two of them produced the most unpleasant sound I've heard since the last time they met each other here in my shop. Even the screaming I could tolerate if not for the mess that is to come.
"SCcREeeeEHHHKKKKK!"
That one broke a few jars.